viernes, 19 de febrero de 2010

The Little Shop Of Horrors

Seymour is a geeky loser who works for a flower shop named Mushnik’s Shop, where he pines away hoping to fall in love with the girl of her dreams, Audrey. His dream includes creating a new kind of plant, a plant that can not only talk, but has a big taste for human flesh and blood. Soon Seymour sees himself selling his soul and committing crimes for the devil plant. Will he be able to destroy the creature, or will it destroy him first? It’s a little sad that this movie has now been almost completely overshadowed by it’s 80’s musical comedy, which is now as big a part of the culture as Ghostbusters or other mayor 80’s films. But in all it’s defense, this movie is a very good comedy film, even if it is low budget. The actors are all great. Jonathan Haze is great as the geeky Seymour and Jackie Joseph (who was later in Gremlins) is very pretty and is less annoying than the actress that appeared in the musical remake. I also prefer the actor who played Mushnik, Mel Welles, just because he looks like every time he talks, he looks like he’s about to have a heart attack. We also get a lot of good cameos, the most memorable of course is Jack Nicholson as a masochistic client in the dentist’s office, who really loves getting dental torture. His character would later appear in the guise of Bill Murray in the remake. This one also has a very funny cameo by Dick Miller, who is a Corman and Joe Dante regular, as a guy who eats flowers. Roger Corman once boasted that he was able to make this movie in three days. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but if it shows on something, it’s on the plant itself, the gigantic Audrey II. Because of the budget, the creature is definitely a letdown. It doesn’t have any of the personality or evil attitude of the creature in the 80’s remake, but it’s forgivable because of it being a different time and, to be honest, an independent production. The script is still solid as hell, it’s simply very funny, has great acting, and has a pretty good Dragnet parody (and I love me some Dragnet). This movie comes very well recommended, especially if you’ve only seen the remake.